The median advertised pay for a travel PACU (post-anesthesia care unit) contract in California is $2,742 per week, with the middle half between $2,571 and $2,831. Measured across 25 active travel PACU contracts in California at 20 facilities, as of 2026-10-31.
Advertised weekly totals before tax, usually including tax-free stipends; for almost all postings the top of an advertised range. Not take-home.
That is 12 percent over the $2,455 national median for travel PACU contracts.
California is not a Nurse Licensure Compact state, so you need a California license to work here even if you hold a multistate license. The compact state list explains which states issue one, and the compact checker tells you whether yours covers you here.
| Weekly rate | Open contracts |
|---|---|
| Under $2,300 | 2 |
| $2,300 to $2,400 | 4 |
| $2,400 to $2,500 | 0 |
| $2,500 to $2,600 | 1 |
| $2,600 to $2,700 | 0 |
| $2,700 to $2,800 | 11 |
| $2,800 to $2,900 | 3 |
| $2,900 and up | 4 |
All 25 open contracts, banded by advertised weekly rate. The outer bands are open-ended so nothing falls outside the chart.
California has the highest price level of the 51 states and territories the Bureau of Economic Analysis measures: 11 percent over the national average overall. The premium is concentrated in housing, at 54 percent over, while goods sit 6 percent over and services 3 percent over. That matters more than the headline number, because housing is the part a tax-free stipend is meant to cover and the rest comes out of taxed wages.
| Metro | Open contracts | Median weekly | Rent, 1 bed |
|---|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | 8 | $2,749 | $2,680/mo |
| Saint Helena | 2 | $2,719 | $1,960/mo |
| Arcata | 1 | $1,910 | $1,180/mo |
| Castro Valley | 1 | $2,786 | $2,100/mo |
| Glendale | 1 | $2,957 | $2,365/mo |
| Lakeport | 1 | $2,831 | — |
| Los Angeles | 1 | $2,384 | $2,150/mo |
| Modesto | 1 | $2,571 | $1,210/mo |
| Oakland | 1 | $2,761 | $1,920/mo |
| Petaluma | 1 | $2,367 | $2,555/mo |
| Pomona | 1 | $2,307 | $1,810/mo |
| Sacramento | 1 | $1,389 | $1,630/mo |
Rent is the one-bedroom Fair Market Rent HUD publishes for that metro, which is what a housing stipend is trying to cover. The open-contract count beside each metro is the sample its median rests on, and outside the largest markets that sample is small: a median over one or two contracts is a single posting's rate rather than a market rate, so read the count first.
Browse the board for current PACU assignments in California.
Over the last seven days the median advertised rate rose 1.4 percent, from $2,694 to $2,731 a week. Measured against the seven days before it, across 29 open postings, 2026-10-18 to 2026-10-31.
This compares advertised rates within one specialty in one state, which is the only cut where a change in the median is likely to mean a change in price rather than a change in which contracts are posted. Where the number of open postings moves sharply, no figure is shown.
Drawn from the postings that state a requirement, which is not all of them, so each figure carries the number it was measured from. Your recruiter confirms the specifics for a given contract before submission.
All 33 states with PACU openings